NEW YORK, March 2: The United States must press Pakistan to address the resurgent Islamism that threatens the stability of Pakistan and encourages support for Al Qaeda in the country, says Nancy Soderberg senior National Security Adviser in the Clinton administration.
Ms Soderberg who informally launched her book "The Super Power Myth -The use and misuse of American Might" at New York's foreign Press centre on Tuesday she asserts that "with Pakistan and Afghanistan at risk, America's war on terror is at risk" noting "after nearly three years of US involvement, Afghanistan is still marked by rampant violence lawlessness, extreme poverty and fragile government".
"Such conditions resemble the conditions which enabled the emergence of Taliban in 1990s. They also enable Bin Laden and Al Qaeda to continue to threaten the United States from inside Afghanistan and along the border with Pakistan," she underscores.
Ms Soderberg chides the Bush administration for what she calls: "turning a blind eye to President Pervez Musharraf's running roughshod over the democratic institutions in Pakistan".
She says although Gen Musharraf under threat made a promise to end the support for Taliban, "But the administration failed to see the risk of a rise of Islamic extremism."
Ms Soderberg who agreed that the past and present American administration may have contributed to the rise in extremism in Pakistan due to its consistent support for the military regimes in the country particularly in 1980s during the Afghan war, however, she said that "it was no use complaining about this.
Its time for the people of Pakistan to do something about it." But she did not offer any insight as to when and how the American support for the military regimes could be ended.
RICE THE RISING STAR: Ms Soderberg, who also served as the US ambassador to the United Nations, when Madeleine Albright the former US ambassador at the world body left for Washington to become US Secretary of State, predicted that the present US Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice may be in line for a Nobel Peace Prize.
"As a critic of the Bush administration and a Democrat, I'm not a fan of Rice's record as national security adviser. But if her new rhetoric means a real second-term conversion, she may go down in history as one of the most successful secretaries of State ever," she said.
She said "US actions over the last four years have been driven by Ms Rice and colleagues who believe that as the lone superpower, the United States is powerful enough to act whenever and wherever it wants, primarily through military means.
That costly myth has made the superpower burden heavier - and spiked anti-Americanism to unprecedented levels that, in turn, breed further terrorist attacks. There are signs, however, that the administration may be abandoning this myth."
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